[Prevalence of processes and pathologies in emergency hospital care]

To study the behavioural differences between scheduled and emergency admissions in the processes most prevalent in Spanish hospitals and their relationship with the age of patients, comparing 2002 and 2007.

Observational and descriptive design for those years. Diagnostic related groups (DRGs) were classified into high prevalence (the 25 most frequent) and the rest; four subgroups were prepared according to this (high or low) and admission (elective or not). Mean length of stay was analyzed, together with relative weight, number of diagnoses and procedures and mortality by age, using the Student and/or ANOVA tests for quantitative variables and Pearson's chi(2) qualitative comparison of means and proportions for tabular data, assuming statistical significance at p <0.05.

The high prevalence and emergency admission subgroup has higher age, ratio of males, mean length of stay, mortality, number of diagnoses and procedures (all p <0.0001), in both 2002 and 2007. The complexity and resource consumption measured by such variables peaks in the 65-69 and 70-74 cohorts respectively, with emergency admission.

There are clear differences between the processes according to their prevalence and accessibility; priority must be given to knowledge and information on the most frequent and urgent admissions to improve the effectiveness, efficiency and quality.